BigBrother brought home a little “All About My Mom” kind of book from school for Mother’s Day. He answered the questions or finished the statements on each page about me. My oldest son? He’s a smart kid. The end of the statement, “My mother looks prettiest when…” …?

“ALL THE TIMME.”

Smartest. Kid. Ever. Sign him up for MENSA. He wins at being six.

Today my boys loved on me. We colored, ate some food, watched some kids sing a song, read some books. They let me nap for 30 minutes this evening, which made me feel human again.

Of course, they also had to love on FireDad who turned 30 today.

We actually celebrated his birthday on Friday since he doesn’t like to share his day. Okay, it’s not that he doesn’t like to share. Today he made me breakfast and doted on me, so we wanted to make sure he got doted on at some point close to his birthday.

As a birthday present to him, some teenage girl working at the drive-thru when we picked up our iced tea did a double-take, googly-eyed, total check out of his 30-year-old self. As we drove away, he exclaimed, “I still got it!”

Yes you do, my handsome husband. Happy birthday. Welcome to your 30′s. They’re kinda awesome.

…sushi with my daughter in April.

…wishers with BigBrother in May.

…flutes with LittleBrother in June.

…ice cream with super heroes in July.

…fun in San Diego at BlogHer in August.

…funny faces with Booey in September.

…leaving NYC in October.

…riding in the Christmas parade with my boys in November.

…anniversary date night with my husband in December.

…100 days of school with BigBrother in January.

…a bid on a new house in February.

…St. Patrick’s Day fun (right after buying a house) in March.

…kite flying after supper in April.

30 happened. And it was good. 31 begins in the morning, and I honestly can’t wait to see what it brings.

I went into labor the day after Thanksgiving four years ago. My mother-in-law eventually made me call my husband home from work, and the next day, we welcomed LittleBrother into the world — into our family.

It’s been an interesting year with Booey. He’s full of spunk and pizzazz and attitude and chutzpah and Booey-ness. He is very much so his own little person, and bless your poor soul if you try to help him zip his jacket. “I can do it mineself!” Foot stomping good time, it has been. Let me tell you.

He tells jokes — including fart jokes. And, uh, other jokes. According to him, he can read. Actually, according to him, he can do anything his older brother can do — and sometimes things his brother can’t do. He’s big. He’s bold. He’s not scared of anything.

But he’s a lover too. No less than once a day he tells me, “Mommy, you’re beautiful.” After the umpteenth “Mommy, Mommy, Mommy,” just about when I’m ready to snap, he says, “I love you, Mommy.” When I do something that he thinks is good, he praises me. He cuddles. He kisses. He hugs. He loves. He is tender and kind-hearted and, despite that mischievous grin, he’s really a good boy.

This year he shares his birthday with Thanksgiving, and let me tell you, we are thankful for all that he is to us.

At the very least, he’s not shorted on what’s inside the presents, so that counts for something. Mental note: Buy lots of non-Christmas wrapping paper in early November next year.

First and foremost: Some aspects of the Mario birthday party are easier thanks to the release of Mario Kart and New Super Mario Bros. Wii in the past few years. Birthday Express is where I ordered our Super Mario Bros. party supplies from, and I was pleased with them. (Of note: They also have a Mario Kart birthday set.) Now that I’ve got the first and foremost out: I never just rely on a kit birthday set.

I bought two sets of dinner plates featuring Mario, two sets of dessert plates featuring Luigi, and two sets of napkins (mushrooms!). I then filled out the rest of the plates with red and green (Mario and Luigi), red and green cups, and red and green silverware. I’ve always done this. It’s one way to add characters to a party without spending an arm and a leg. Adults don’t need character plates anyway, though I was happy to have a mushroom napkin. 1 up! I got some red and green table covers and some red and green streamers as well to round out the whole Mario and Luigi feel of the room.

I kept the balloons to a minimum because there are no local places that actually fill balloons anymore, and as such we had to buy our own helium tank. I filled a few red, a few green, a few blue and white cloud baloons and the two Mario and Luigi mylar balloons I bought to match the theme.

One great thing that I encountered while planning this party was Pinterest. This is the first year that I’ve thrown the boys’ birthday party since Pinterest has been in existence. I will tell you this: It’s a double edged sword. I found a ton of amazing cake ideas. I honestly wanted to make my famous rainbow cake (think Rainbow Road!) with blue icing and stars (original link), but I hit a brick wall as the date for the party came and decided to order a cake. As I stood at a local bakery, looking through their cake sets, the lady said to me, “Isn’t Mario a little out-dated?” I may have had a slightly snippy tone when I replied, “Well, they released a new game last year, so no.” In short: no cake set. So I ordered two sets of Super Mario Bros. figures to set on top of the ordered cake. Problem solved.

I also put Mario and Luigi on top of the top cupcake on my cupcake holder. I did make the cupcakes myself; as the cake was chocolate, I made Martha’s vanilla cupcakes with vanilla buttercream icing, and, in a stroke of timing win, I covered them with red and green sprinkles. What’s the perfect time of year to throw a Mario (red) and Luigi (green) party? Right before Christmas! Score! So stock up in the after-season sales if you know a child in your house is going to want a Mario Bros. party in the next year.

I briefly considered this crazy Mario cupcake spread (original link), but again, I just didn’t have it in me to pull that off.

I hate party games, but kids love party games and so — party games it was! We played Pin the Mustache on Mario. You can print a mustache template. I ordered Mario silk poster that we stuck on the wall for the game. It’s actually high quality and will be going up in the boys’ playroom. Cutting out 30 mustaches was exhausting, and I had initially planned on making a bucket of mustaches on sticks for people to hold up for pictures. Yet another project that ended up getting scrapped because I value my sanity.

The other party game we played was rather easy: Find the gold coins! The boys hid a bunch (150+) gold coins around the room while the adults did the other decorating in honor of how Mario and Luigi’s goal in life is to collect the most gold coins. (Well, and save the Princess.) The problem I ran into with this game is that the boys “hid” the coins in not so hidden places. As such, the kids had been finding them well before the game kicked off. One of the older kids (a tween) at the party helped us out and re-hid the already found one. As such, a tip: Kick off the party with the “find the coins” game.

The party goodie bags were the biggest Pinterest win-slash-fail that I found for my party. I absolutely fell in love with these adorable Mario mushroom goodie bags (original link via Etsy). I didn’t put the eyes on my goodie bags for this reason: I put hours and hours and hours into the bags that I eventually ended up with in the end. I only payed for the brown lunch bags as I had the red, green and white foam hanging around the house. As our parties are big (two kids = twice the party gueses), I had to make 26 bags. I probably had 12 hours tied into these bags. My tip: Use something stronger than Elmer’s school glue sticks. The Elmer’s craft glue sticks actually worked much better. But still? I’m really, really proud of them.

I served a lot of good food. Pizza from our favorite local pizza place, Wally’s, my own variation of Simply Recipe’s Baked Ziti, a very big veggie tray, my buffalo dip, my mom’s clam dip, hummus, salsa, guacamole, ranch dip, and various chips and pretzels. We also had red and green M&M’s (again, Mario and Luigi meet Christmas) and a great mix of peanuts and such from my grandmother-in-law. I almost made a double batch of buffalo dip, but doubted myself — and I should have. It was gone very quickly. In short, the food was a hit — and I actually ate some.

In short: It was a really great party. All of the little things that some people make fun of me for doing came together to make a really nice party for a bunch of little kids. You can also check out my Mario and Luigi Birthday Party Pinterest board. And really, it comes down to these two little guys having a great time.

They loved their party so hard, and that’s what matters most to me!

The last one we have is this gem from BigBrother’s first birthday party:

Classic.

So, I was happy to get a picture with both of my birthday boys and my husband yesterday. We should probably remember to do this every year and not just every five years. Goodness.

I looked at him and agreed. “Totally.”

After school as we walked back to our car, he took off running. “I’m faster now, Mom!”

“Yes, yes you are.”

As we got ready to go to the fire department to have cupcakes and open his presents with FireDad, he followed every instruction I have him — the first time. “Do you know why I’m listening so well, Mommy?”

“Why, Buddy?”

“Because I’m six.”

I could get used to this.

Happy Birthday, my BigBrother.

And so far, I’ve had the best week of my 30′s.

Sure, I’ve been 30 for all of four days… but trust me, I just set the bar pretty high.